Postgraduate Dissertation Bootcamp: Preparation and Planning
When:
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Venue:
Online
This workshop focuses on the early stages of your dissertation.
This workshop concentrates on the preliminary stages of the dissertation research and writing. It is suitable for students who are early in their dissertation writing process, including considering a research area and formulating a question, writing a dissertation proposal, and undertaking preliminary research. This will be more relevant to students who have not yet begun their dissertations, or who have begun their research and would like to review their process so far and plan their next steps.
This workshop will cover:
- formulating a research question
- project management: managing the writing process
- dissertation structures
- considering literature reviews
Although the workshop may be helpful for dissertation writers from any discipline, the workshop will particularly focus on empirical research dissertations. Empirical research is usually found in scientific, social science and vocational subjects, and such dissertations use questionnaires, surveys, lab experiments and other methods to gather original data, and follow a formal report structure, rather than primarily researching from secondary literature, books and journals.
The workshop is primarily aimed at postgraduate students, but undergraduate students or PhD researchers may also find it helpful.
The slides and a recording of this workshop will be found in the Birkbeck Study Skills Moodle Module, in the Writing Skills Resources section.
The Dissertations Bootcamp series takes place in May and June 2026
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This workshop is part of the Postgraduate Dissertation Bootcamp 2026 series of Study Skills workshops, the full listing of which may be viewed at this link. These workshops are aimed at those who will be addressing a dissertation at postgraduate level, but undergraduate researchers might also find it helpful. The resources and a recording of this workshop are available from the Birkbeck Study Skills Moodle module, in the Writing Skills Resources/Dissertations section at this link (student login required).
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This online workshop is delivered via Microsoft Teams. You will receive a confirmation in your email inbox after you register for the workshop, and the Teams link will be available about an hour before the start of the workshop. It's intended for enrolled Birkbeck students only.
The full listing of Study Skills workshops for this term can be viewed here. For 1-to-1 study support, find out more about the helpdesk via this link, or about school-specific tutors and resources via this link. For support finding resources (books, eBooks, articles, etc.) you may find out more about the Academic Services Librarians at this link.
Contact name: Ray Rose Raymond
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